


Asunder

by hhavenh



Category: Fire Emblem: Soen no Kiseki/Akatsuki no Megami | Fire Emblem Path of Radiance/Radiant Dawn
Genre: M/M, Post-RD, Tellius Week 2020, a jealous boy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-29
Updated: 2020-08-29
Packaged: 2021-03-06 16:55:34
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,547
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26182252
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hhavenh/pseuds/hhavenh
Summary: Volke sat back on his heels, head tilted such that the firelight shined golden on his hair. A glow that clung to each flyaway strand and made softer the shape of his face, and even the always sharp expectation of his eyes. Expectation wasn’t the right word, not exactly, but there was something in his gaze that lately made Geoffrey feel so…lacking. So insufficient. As if that which bound them were the thinnest of strands. Mere threads that were a single sour look or hasty word from snapping apart.
Relationships: Foruka | Volke/Geoffrey
Kudos: 3





	Asunder

Immediately the ache was so much _worse,_ a searing suddenness that caught burning and bright at the base of Geoffrey’s throat. The pain did not waiver, not for the barest second, a choker of stopped breath and gritted teeth that refused his every attempt to-.

“Breathe.”

Geoffrey tried. At first faltering, a ragged exhale that razed his throat as it left. Pressure built with each pass of too-firm hands over his shoulders, his skin made damp and further discolored by the spread of the medicinal. There was some grit left in the emerald paste. A rasp of something like sand between his flesh and the hands kneading him that was strangely satisfying despite the pain. Warmth followed the rasp, nearly a burn, but that just spoke to the potency of the tonic. That, and the unyielding odor of eucalyptus and yarrow.

“Th-there,” he managed, nearly breathless. One hand paused at the back of his neck, the other to the left of his spine, fingers spanning what felt like a roiling mound beneath his flesh. “Right there, but don’t just-.”

“Hush.”

It was a strange relief to be silenced. Geoffrey exhaled again, a forced void of his lungs that did nothing to make less the tension coiling the length of his spine. He had not yet seen the extent of the damage, only the ill shades of burgundy and blue creeping over the top of his shoulders, but that meant little when every unfortunate twitch of flesh set his back aflame as would a burning brand.

The hand on Geoffrey’s neck lifted, gone for a quiet moment before it returned cool and indistinct. The scent of eucalyptus and yarrow grew stronger. “This’ll be worse if you don’t breathe.”

Geoffrey didn’t have a moment to respond before the pain returned, again so shockingly sudden that his breath caught. He struggled past the choking burn, sucking air through his gritted teeth. His hands were sore, clenched in desperate white fists as his fingers dug into his knees. He should have laid down when given the chance. This wouldn’t have been so bad, these relentless hands, still too firm as they passed over that roiling mound, pressing and kneading and rasping, setting him on _fire and..._

And there, finally.

 _Finally,_ the fire quit.

“That it?”

Geoffrey slowly unclenched his jaw, and then his hands. “That. Yeah.” He let his head hang, eyes unfocused on the pattern of the rug.

The hands didn’t leave, felt from the pressure rather than the feel. The ache wasn’t gone so much as it was smothered beneath a new tide, a cool wave that swept down his spine and made gooseflesh erupt on his arms. “Shouldn’t have waited,” Volke murmured as he spread the paste across the rest of Geoffrey’s back, nearly a whisper no matter that they were alone in these chambers. “Wouldn’t have been this bad.”

He wasn’t wrong.

“I know.” The words slipped out, soft in a way Geoffrey hadn’t intended. Defeat in a sound, though there was no reason for it.

Volke’s hands came to a slow halt on either side of Geoffrey’s throat, pressing minutely against the crux of his neck and shoulders. “…You won, didn’t you?”

Geoffrey smiled at the floor, a tired twist of his lips that faded just as swiftly. This moment did not feel like victory. Water dripped from the tip of his hanging bangs and made dark spots on the rug, remnant of a bath that had done little to soothe either his body or mind for how much he’d insisted. “I did, yes.”

Champion of the year’s first tourney, and guaranteed a seat in the quarterfinals for the rest of the season. Certainly no small accomplishment, grappling never an event that Geoffrey was confident in. Reaching the final bracket had been a surprise, and was perhaps more a testament to the caliber of participants this year than a true gauge of Geoffrey’s skill. Quarterstaff, archery, to make no mention of his talents at a joust, Geoffrey could and would sing his own praises, but to grapple was just…it was difficult not to forget himself in a match. To not erupt with untempered violence the way such an act encouraged.

And certainly so, given his last opponent.

Geoffrey’s lip lifted, teeth shown though there was nothing to be intimidated but for the flickering hearth.

 _Charlene_. What a contemptuous cretin of a man. Of a lord. There wasn’t a more vile, a more asinine creature within the capital than the Count of Sheral.

Oh, how he’d _boasted._ So pompous, so vain, so certain of his victory before Geoffrey had even entered the ring. The sort of man that could win a crowd with little more than a clever heckle. And yet no matter how bloodied at the end, how limp and senseless Charlene was splayed across the red-soaked sand, somehow Geoffrey was still so far from satisfied.

A minute more, seconds even, and Charlene might not have left the ring at all.

“Geoffrey.”

Geoffrey blinked. “Hmm?”

The mattress shifted behind him as the hands disappeared, something strange and restless in his shoulders to no longer be touched.

It only took a moment for Volke to be before him, barefoot and dressed in a too-large shirt that showed the hollow of his throat. Geoffrey tried to straighten, and hissed when his neck seized at the attempt. “What?”

Another moment and Volke knelt.

He sat back on his heels, head tilted such that the firelight shined golden on his hair. A glow that clung to each flyaway strand and made softer the shape of his face, and even the always sharp expectation of his eyes. Expectation wasn’t the right word, not exactly, but there was something in his gaze that lately made Geoffrey feel so…lacking. So insufficient. As if that which bound them were the thinnest of strands. Mere threads that were a single sour look or hasty word from snapping asunder.

Even without that sharpness it was not an unknown man at Geoffrey’s feet, but still one so rarely seen.

And Geoffrey wasn’t even sure how to enjoy the sight.

[hhinangha](https://twitter.com/hhinangha/status/1299834297373908993)

“Plan on getting to it anytime soon?” Volke’s expression didn’t shift, everything about him still nearly soft and edged in gold, but the dry expectancy of his voice pulled smartly at the threads spanning Geoffrey’s chest.

Clearing his throat did nothing to ease the sensation. “How do you mean?”

Volke considered him with a look that Geoffrey used to think cold. “Thought you’d be too tired to play games tonight.”

“You think I’m playing games?” Geoffrey demanded, eyes wide and brows arched. “Me?”

Volke was unmoved. As ever. His expression unchanged, eyes still. So infuriating unaffected.

But fine. If he wanted this made plain, then Geoffrey would oblige. “…I saw you.”

“You see me often.”

Tired as he was, sore as he was, Geoffrey almost didn’t catch his temper before he’d done more than furiously flare his nostrils and show his teeth. “With that man,” he hissed, hands again so sore as they clenched on his knees. He dropped his eyes back to the rug, as if the water-spotted pattern would help reign his words. “I-, I can’t count the number of times I’ve seen you in Charlene’s company.” An exaggeration, fine. It didn’t matter. The dozen occurrences were no less damning than would be a hundred, especially considering such a philandering disgrace as the Count of Sheral.

“Get to it.”

Geoffrey lifted his eyes, “What?”

Volke could have been a statue. “Ask me what you want to know.”

Damn him.

He couldn’t possibly mean to make Geoffrey go any further? To be verbal with…with what was obviously afoot? Volke could be cold, and even callous, but this cruel? To force him to give voice to the bitter certainty within that Geoffrey was so far from enough?

Was that really needed?

“…Never mind,” Geoffrey grit, gaze returned to the floor. What sort of fool was he, allowing this conversation? There would be no happy end to it. Ignorance was a rarely lauded reward, to not even have the consideration of such a thing spawning so constantly behind his eyes. But even considering it, even wondering and dreading and knowing that…that he was not _sufficient_ was still so different a beast to swallow than would be the raw truth. A preferred beast, if Geoffrey was to be honest. “Forget I said anything.”

Enough effort, and perhaps he would forget as well.

“…Could,” Volke murmured, still so quiet as he lifted his hands to Geoffrey’s knees. The pads of his fingers were emerald, a stain that went up the side of each digit and bathed his palms. “Or you could just ask me what you want to know.”

As if it were so simple. “And I’m to believe that you’d answer?”

Volke’s fingers settled between his own. “Ask the right question, and I will.”

Good goddess, _this man._ So infuriating when he had a mind to be. So demanding and insistent.

Fine. Geoffrey could be just as frank. He pushed as straight as his back would allow, jaw set and brows low. “Are you laying with him?”

Immediately, without hesitation, “No.”

“No?” Geoffrey repeated, nearly aghast. “That’s it?”

Volke’s brows came together. “…What else is there?”

“What else?” Geoffrey rasped, a little desperate. A little lost. “If you’re not-, if he isn’t-.” Couldn’t finish. Couldn’t say it again, just to be fed another denial. He’d been ready, prepared even, to accept that his attentions weren’t enough. That the threads between them were just that, thin strands of nearly nothing that would soon be no more. “You can’t expect me to believe that it is nothing more than work.”

“Why not?”

Closing his eyes did nothing to bank Geoffrey’s frustration. “…I cannot abide the way he looks at you,” he admitted, nearly a snarl. “And you let him. It’s like you don’t care if you’re seen on his balcony, or at his clubs, and I can’t even have a blasted _dinner_ with you outside of these walls.”

He’d not meant to raise his voice.

The distant chatter of the fireplace was the only sound for a time. That, and the resounding thud of Geoffrey’s heart. This was the moment. The exact instant that the threads between them finally snapped apart.

“I’m sorry.”

Geoffrey opened his eyes, his mouth dry, “So…you are-.”

“I’m not sleeping with Charlene.” Volke pushed forward on his knees, hands a sudden coolness against either side of Geoffrey’s face. “I’m not.”

“…Then I just don’t understand,” Geoffrey whispered.

Volke bit the inside of his lip, eyes away. The fire yet shined on his hair like a halo, a golden glow that showed through the loose fabric of his shirt and lit upon the taper of his waist. His dark eyes were still softened, the color so deep and damning a red that to look away could not be managed. He looked so incredibly _fetching_ that the thought to just be done with this whole wretched conversation and take him against the sheets flashed behind Geoffrey’s eyes almost too intently to be denied. “I thought you would appreciate it.”

“Appreciate what?” Geoffrey snapped, so sudden and stricken that the whole of him grew tight. A mistake, as his back immediately stated complaint. “What in the world would I appreciate about some-, some cox-combed _knave_ of a lord showing you about like a-.”

Volke’s fingers grew tight. “Shut up.”

Again, and far more irate than the first time, Geoffrey was silent.

“Count Charlene is far from a discrete man,” Volke murmured, the pressure of his fingers gradually less. “But he is a rich man. Rich enough that he can conduct business in the open, with no regard for his reputation.” Truer words never spoken. Even the thrashing he’d received at the tourney would no doubt do little to diminish him in the eyes of Melior. “So when he has a job, and wants to discuss it where anyone can see…I let him.”

“…Why?” More gritted than he’d intended, but Geoffrey was beyond the point of leashing his mood.

As ever, it was some matter startling to see Volke smile. Even as he was now, the corner of his lips so barely quirked as if he were resisting the call of a sudden amusement. Not a smile, not entirely, but enough of one to make something suspicious tighten Geoffrey’s gut. “You like to ask questions about my work that I can’t answer.” His hands were cool. Even soft as his thumbs slowly swept against either side of Geoffrey’s face. “And you’re bothered by it.”

…He wasn’t wrong.

“I’m not bothered,” Geoffrey said anyway. “I-, I just don’t-.”

“So I let him act the fool,” Volke continued, low enough that Geoffrey forced himself silent, “if that means that you see me in his company.” He bit his lip again, a flash of uncertainty that passed in the space of a breath. “I honestly thought you’d be pleased to know something about my work, even if just the identity of a client. Didn’t realize it’d make you so…upset.”

That-, that was just so ridiculous. Absurd, even.

But it made such sense.

And was exactly Volke’s way. To take something he knew Geoffrey objected to and deal with it in so roundabout a manner. "Upset," Geoffrey echoed hollowly. "Did you see what I did to that man? _Upset_ does not even begin to-."

"I saw. " Volke murmured, a strange quality to his voice. And there again, that almost smile. "And I… I get it. Not my best idea."

A terrible idea. The absolute worst.

“…I hate seeing him with you,” Geoffrey confessed. It felt wrong to be verbal with so childish a feeling. To voice his possession this bluntly. “You’ll speak to him for hours at the Cesaar Club, and not even let me take you out for a drink.”

Volke sighed. And then he leaned forward and met Geoffrey for a kiss. A chaste thing that lasted but a moment and tasted of the open bourbon on the mantle. “You know why.” His voice was no less steady. No less quiet. “His reputation can stand to be seen with a fireman.”

And what an injustice that was.

By no merit but his birth, but his coffers and property, Charlene could flounce around the capital with barely a black mark to his name, while Geoffrey was held to so more rigid a standard. Doubted and besmirched so easily despite his laurels, for nothing more than the misfortune of being born a nephew so far removed from Delbray’s lordship that his title did not even promise him an inheritance.

Perhaps it was actually a little more satisfying now, to have dealt Charlene such a decisive defeat.

Geoffrey exhaled. Long and hard enough that his chest began to burn. He made peace with what tomorrow would feel like and snaked his arms around Volke’s waist before tipping them both back against the sheets. He was so tired. And sore. And cold.

And so savagely jealous. “…I still hate it.”

Volke crossed his arms on Geoffrey’s chest and smiled. Sudden and rakish and so effortlessly charming that Geoffrey forgot himself and smiled back. “Yeah, I think I got that.” 


End file.
